This section is intended to provide a background or context to the invention that is recited in the claims. The description herein may include concepts that could be pursued, but are not necessarily ones that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated herein, what is described in this section is not prior art to the description and claims in this application and is not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
Certain abbreviations that may be found in the description and/or in the Figures are herewith defined as follows:
AAA authentication, authorization, and accounting
ACK acknowledgement
AP access point
CM connection manager
DM device management
DSP digital signal processor
EAP extensible authentication protocol
EAPOL EAP over LAN
HTTP hypertext transport protocol
HTTPS hypertext transport protocol secure
LAN local area network
MO managed object
OMA open mobile affiance
OMA-DM open mobile affiance device management
SOAP service oriented architectural pattern
SSID service set identifier
UD user device
URI uniform resource indicator
VLAN virtual local area network
WLAN wireless local area network
XML extensible markup language
Wi-Fi is a Trademark of the Wi-Fi Alliance and is associated with various products that belong to a class of wireless local area network (WLAN) devices based on the IEEE 802.11 standards. The term Wi-Fi is often found to be used as a synonym for IEEE 802.11 technology.
Public Wi-Fi hotspot networks are widely deployed today in many environments such as hotels, restaurants, coffee shops, airports, malls and public/private offices. Internet access through these hotspot networks requires a user to either have a subscription with the operator of that hotspot network or some type of roaming arrangement.
Although an industry forum effort referred to as Hotspot 2.0 has been working to simplify the process of accessing public Wi-Fi hotspot networks, present day methods to create credentials and obtain a subscription with a Wi-Fi operator still remain cumbersome.